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The Happiest (And Saddest) Countries In The World

The United States is a nation in decline. Last year the land of the free and the home of the brave came in 10th place in the annual rankings of World’s Happiest Countries. This year the U.S.A. has slipped to 12th.

The U.S. has slipped in the areas of Governance, Personal Freedom, and most troubling, in Entrepreneurship & Opportunity. The slide in that final category, according to the report, “is due to a decline in citizens’ perception that working hard gets you ahead.”

Whether you think this is a temporary fluke or a leading indicator of the collapse of a great country depends on what your politics are. (Please leave your comments on that topic below.)

The Legatum Prosperity Index is based on a study of 142 countries comprising 96% of global population. Nations are analyzed and ranked on 89 indicators in 8 categories such as education, government and economics. Per capita GDP — basically how rich a nation is — is a factor in the index, but the whole point of the Legatum study is to look beyond such a simple measure at all the myriad issues that make up wellbeing and prosperity.

In general, the most prosperous (thus “happiest” in my book) countries enjoy stable political institutions, a strong civil society with freedom of expression, good education and healthcare, personal freedom and a feeling of being safe and secure.

Under those measures the U.S. is getting less happy.

U.S. unemployment remains stubbornly high and start-up costs are rising, while high-tech exports are in decline. As Nathan Gamester, project director of the index, explains:

“Even within the realm of economic health, broader measures can illuminate the drivers of change and serve as leading indicators. Take, for example, citizens’ perceptions of job markets. In India and China, the percentages of citizens who think that it is a good time to find a job is 40% and 36%, respectively. In the U.S. and U.K., those percentages are, respectively, 26% and 12%.”

So who are the happiest people in the world, as measured by Legatum? Norway takes the crown, followed by Denmark and Sweden (which leapfrogged Australia and New Zealand this year). Rounding out the Scandinavians is Finland, just a few steps behind in the seventh spot.

Luxembourg is the healthiest nation on Earth. Iceland is the safest. Switzerland has the world’s best economy and governance, according to Legatum.

What’s Norway got that the rest of the world doesn’t? For one thing, a stunning per capita GDP of $57,000 a year. Norwegians have the second-highest level of satisfaction with their standards of living: 95% say they are satisfied with the freedom to choose the direction of their lives; an unparalleled 74% say other people can be trusted. It sure doesn’t hurt that the massive Norwegian welfare state is bankrolled by high taxes and big reserves of offshore oil and gas.

On the other side of the spectrum, the lowest ranking, or saddest country on the Prosperity Index, is the Central African Republic. There the per capita GDP is $790 per year, life expectancy is 48, and just 2% of people have internet access at home. Right behind the CAR at the bottom are Congo, Afghanistan, Zimbabwe and Haiti.

Though the good people at the Legatum Group (founded by New Zealand billionaire Christopher Chandler) are certainly making a good faith effort toward figuring out the key traits of successful societies, there are some areas where their data is unreliable.

Many of the inputs for the Index come from surveys of citizens in the countries. This is problematic because opinion polls are inherently subjective, and because of cultural and educational differences people in different countries may have starkly varying takes on the same circumstance.

For instance, one of the inputs for Legatum’s economic prosperity measure reflects whether citizens of a country “have confidence in financial institutions.” Last year only 48% of Americans reported being confident in financial institutions, versus 61% worldwide. It cannot be the case that America’s banks are less secure than the global average. And it’s silly to rely on subjective opinion for such a thing when there’s plentiful objective data on bank health (see Forbes Rankings of America’s Best and Worst Banks.)

The measurement of “social capital” is problematic as well, as one of the inputs reflects the percentage of citizens who “attended a place of worship” in the past week. I agree that many people glean a lot of social cohesion by going to church, temple or mosque, but there’s also plenty of folks who get the same sense of peace from going to yoga class on the beach or a walk in the woods.

That said, the Legatum survey does a better job of measuring true “happiness” than some of the similar surveys out there.

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What a bunch of BS. Does every list of good things always rank the Scandinavian countries first and the African nations last? It really seems so. This list seems more like a ranking of safest and wealthiest countries not happiest. More well researched studies have concluded that Bhutan is the happiest country in the world. They invented and consider the GNH (Gross National Happiness) as more important than the GDP so that should tell you something. So once again, what a poor and lame list. You should at least change the ranking sequence of countries in your lists FFS. This Norway first Denmark second Australia third is getting really boring and tedious.

It’s not the wealth itself that brings happiness to the countries but with wealth, these countries and including America can have a safer and cleaner environment with tons of open opportunities that anyone can pursue according to their own desires and that’s where the freedom comes in. Which country can you really follow your heart and do what you really want to do? I don’t think there’s many open opportunities in African countries unfortunately.

I see your point Rafael. However, I think they should also study the amount of guns per capita in all these countries. They may find a relation. Most of these scandinavian countries find the american love for high caliber weapons absurd and dangerous.

I see your point Rafael. However I believe they should also study the amount of guns per capita in these nations. They may find a link. Most scandinavian countries find the american love for guns absurd and dangerous. They wouldn’t want those tendencies in their countries.

You should check out Switzerland, then Dai, it is mandatory to have a gun there. What should be noted, is that all of these countries have tiny, homogeneous populations, and added all together equal 1/10 the population of the US. They all, also, happen to be under the US’s protection, and therefore do not maintain military forces adequate to protect their tiny populations. It should not shock anyone, that tiny protectorates or those who benefit from US protection, with almost uniform populations (some of these countries require you to choose a name from a registry), and a lack of any melting pots, are happier societies.

Eh? Rafael, Australia is not in Scandinavia… Scandinavia is not the whealthiest place. The ranking changes every single year. Guess what, Australia isn’t third this year, the country that is third this year, wasn’t third last year…

PS. Safety and money are a part of happiness (being poor and unsafe makes you unhappy).

@Dai Lee, You should check the statistics for guns per capita. Scandinavian countries are in the top 10, they don’t have as many guns as America, but they do have more guns than a lot of countries. They just (generally) know how to use them properly, and don’t go on massacres (except sometimes, recently).

Todd Smith, do you have any idea how much these countries spend on their military? Norway and Sweden are in the top 30 countries for absolute military expenditure. Norway spends more than Mexico with its 100 million people, or Indonesia with 250 million. The combined military budgets of the UK, France and Germany matches Russia and Chinas total. Just Scandinavia has 1/3 the military spending of Russia.

The military spending of Europe is grossly over the top for any realistic opponent or combination of opponents. Saying that the US is “protecting” them from something (what exactly?) is pretty ignorant of the facts.

fyi, and sorry to be a wise ass but “right should be right” as we would put it, finland is not a part of scandinavia as mentioned in the article, sweden, norway and denmark are the scandinavian countries. finland is one of the nordic countries though.

Garm, the US has troops stationed all over Europe. Europeans are being protected from themselves. That is why there has not really been any war in Europe over the last 70 years. Not because the place with the longest history of war on the planet all of a sudden became peaceful, but because the US mandated it. As I said, none of these countries, not a single one, maintains forces adequate to protect their borders… with such small populations to land mass, they’d require Israeli type participation.

Do you honestly feel that Europe is in such a stable state because America has made it so. It’s a rather arrogant claim to say the least, the reason why there hasn’t been such a large scale war for a long time is because WW2 encouraged cohesion between European nations, not because America lend a helping hand to make sure we don’t get out of hand again. Though I will say that i am surprised that America isn’t higher on the list, whenever I’ve visited, people seem exceptionally satisfied, and incredibly happy to be an american citizen

Maybe you need to learn what makes me people happy before you claim everything is BS. Generally, countries who are not starving and have low poverty rates, crime rates, good health, and the least amount of natural disasters and tragedies are happier than those who are starving, in poverty, constant victims of violent crimes, dying, and are victims of frequent natural disasters and tragedies.

We think it obvious that the two are related, but they’re not identical, and we shouldn’t ignore that fact if we’re attempting to quantify one or the other. If I wanted to read an article about the countries with the highest quality of life, I’d look for an article entitled “The Countries with the Highest Quality of Life.” When I read an article about “The World’s Happiest Countries” I’m disappointed to see no serious attempt to legitimately define and measure happiness.

You can’t take it for granted that poverty, crime, and good health are the primary factors influencing happiness levels; maybe it’s really about having a sense of inner peace and the right philosophy to approach life. Maybe it’s just about having good weather!

The information contained in this article is interesting, but the title is really misleading.

I’m pretty sure the Scandanavian countries have loads of regulations compared to the U.S.

But I think that’s not something that’s directly on topic here.

I think what’s more relevant is the greater social harmony & sense of community in those countries. American culture is very lonely and isolated now. That’s why senior retirement communities are so popular with the old folks…

You clearly doesnt know alot about scandinavia. The regulations and laws in our countries are not as stright as in the US. We can do what we wanna do! We use common sense, and social skills to live together not, power and money to dominate others. We dont have to worry about some idiot that are going to sue us for not doing the right things.

Scandinavia have alot to learn by the rest of the world, But the U.S. and the rest of the world has alot to learn by scandinavia.

Of course there are alot of things we can appreciate i Norway, but we don’t! We keep complaining about every little thing! The government, the immigrants, the weather.. you name it! I don’t think we are happier than the rest of the world.

They also have far fewer people experiencing existential angst over their next paycheck – read an outstanding social safety net. They educate their people for low or little cost as far as their brains can take them. They don’t have to worry about losing a friend to treatable pneumonia, as I just did, because of lack of health care. Their social institutions and government are working for them rather than for the oligarchs who buy and sell Congressmen here. I could go on for several hours but for the sake of brevity, I’ll merely say, lawyers aren’t the problem here. The citizens are.

My English suck i know. But i hope people understand what im tryin to say. And my comment might not be thought-through enough! But im a proud Norwegian, and want other people to learn something by our way of thinking.

I want people to think. And they might think im a stupid guy with poor English, but if I get them to try to learn more about scandinavia then Ive achieved what I wanted.

And as i said We have to learn more from other parts of the world, and to be more grateful for what we get.

Mona, you are probably less happy than the rest of the world. That’s OK. You are allowed to be unhappy and to moan and complain about “every little thing!” in Norway. You are also allowed to write bad English. It’s all about freedom of speech.

You have some unhappy “friends”,But most of the rest of us are quite happy :-)

funny thing, you can’t really know about the rest of the world unless you experience it, not saying you haven’t as i don’t know you, but what may seem like a lot of bitching to you is probably small compared to other countries. every country complains about the government, the immigrants, the weather, hell canada ranked 1st in personal freedom for instance and i know plenty of people that think we live in the worst country imaginable with few freedoms not being trampled, i disagree but i’ve seen what we have compared to a lot of countries and we have it pretty great here. i can’t say i know much about your situation but happiness is relative, you have your own problems but are they worse than others?

With a foot in both the U.S. and Northern Europe by upbringing and career, this is all good news, really. As others have noted, the Scandinavian countries are to happiness and the good life what East Germany was to Olympic gold: improbably, they just keep winning, over and over and over. What can we learn from this? Is there a trick?

There is no trick, I can attest that yes, people in Northern Europe really are more fulfilled and positive in a long term sense. Short term there are issues, certainly people drink too much still. But overall the Scandinavian societies have set their proportion of public vs. private sector activities to a much higher ratio than elsewhere, and it has paid off. An emphasis on community over the individual and family has proven to be a wise bet. At the same time, the market is alive and well, entrepreneurs are respected, and a world class education and public health infrastructure insures a pipeline of healthy, happy, high IQ citizens for Scandinavian economies.

The good news is that this is all openly available to replicate. I encourage young people in the U.S. to spend a semester or more living in Scandinavia or Germany, it will open your mind to the kind of advanced and fulfilling society that is possible.

Christopher’s article is worth reading. What is the position of China and India, the two emerging economic powers in the prosperity index ? Scandinavian countries like Norway,Denmark always tops the list,but I am not surprised at America’s downfall,specially after being saved narrowly from fiscal cliff. Out of the saddest countries one from Asia is Afganisthan. In fact in a multi lingual, multi racial country as diverse as India,there are billioneers within the Fortune Magazine’s top 500 list,along with people struggling for two square meals a day.Philosophically, happiness is the mental state of mind. A saint staying in the cave of the Himalayas may have maximum mental peace, whereas a billioneer may not have the same for health or economical reasons.

my friend’s ex-wife makes $88/hour on the internet. She has been without a job for ten months but last month her income was $21926 just working on the internet for a few hours. Go to this web site and read more —- pie21.ℂℴm

#1. Our political ends for Damocrats is Marxism with Republicans weak and afraid to do what is needed! Our give-a-way current Government has designed our Country’s collapse for Marxist tyranny to be possible. God and Christianity is HATED by Obama and his surrounding Satan aligned associated. Hopefully his actions will land him in Leavenworth for Treason. One elder Patriot.

I get sad when i read this. You have missunderstood so much of the Christian way of living, What about “the strong Protect the weak”. Obama Is the best thing that could happen to the US.

Have a look at the countries on the top of the list. Theyre all countries based on a Sosialcapitalistic model that make sure of a flow in economy, in financial difficalt times the government are using money and so the private companies are making money.

Economic climate is not good with the whole world threatening to go into recession how did European countries be doing well with Eurozone crisis? What about other social, political and other factors which determine the critieria of well being.

Friends in Norway and I have been having conversation regarding the differences between Norway and the US, and how Norway leads all indicators over the US, they believe it’s a good thing to redistribute wealth, pay higher taxes, and live in a welfare state so that the playing field is more equal and fair, and how the US needs to become more like Norway before the US completely declines. No doubt Norway is a beautiful and perfect place to live, my response after learning more about Norway, was Norway is like a private country club and the taxes are like the initiation fee to become a member. Norway is predominately white and christian, only 4million people in the entire country, no national debt and over a 700billion surplus and the 5th largest exporter of oil (with a huge carbon footprint which no one ever wants to mention). So, yes Norway is a perfect place but who can compete when your country is an exclusive private country club who has a rich beneficiary that takes care of all the clubs debt. Wow, I want to be a member as well!

What a lopsided racist stupid ridiculous list – White Europe – Happy, Black Africa – Sad. Over and over, not understanding the history of African countries being raped and pillaged for every type of resource available, having European countries dividing and conquering, stealing and taking, and leaving these countries with no infrastructure, while they use these resources to become financially viable back home – this should make anyone ANGRY, not pleased that they made the list. When you finished compiling this list, did it not fill you with shame, and that perhaps you should try to remedy this wrong against an entire continent of people? FORBES? What about Caribbean islands, don’t tell me that people in Trinidad, Barbados, Cayman Islands and yes, even Jamaica, are not happy. What about Botswana, Cape Verde islands, on and on, (oh, must take deep breath, why did i even read or answer this stupid STUPID list. back to work.)